1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates, in general, to hangers and, more specifically, to plastic hangers.
2. State of the Art
Clothes hangers have been formed of a variety of materials including wire rods, wood, combinations thereof, and plastic. Such clothes hangers include a hook portion and two inclined, diverging shoulder rails connected to and extending from the hook portion. Typically, a horizontal rail is connected between the outer ends of the shoulder rails for strength and to support pants, etc., on the hanger.
Plastic hangers are formed as an integral one-piece assembly, typically, by injection molding. Due to the size and shape of the hanger, the mold cavity is necessarily large thereby enabling only one or just a few hangers to be produced in a single mold in each run cycle. The production rate of such plastic hangers is, therefore, low.
Friction producing surfaces, such as flocking, have been previously applied to portions of hangers to prevent clothes from falling off of the hangers. Typically, loose flocking fibers or particles are sprayed onto an adhesive coating previously sprayed onto the horizontal rail and/or portions of the shoulder rails. However, due to the triangular shape of the interconnected shoulder rails and the horizontal rail, a considerable amount of the sprayed adhesive do not contact the hanger and are wasted thereby increasing the production costs of applying a flocking surface to such hangers.
Thus, it would be desirable to provide a plastic hanger which overcomes the problems of previously devised plastic hangers, particularly those having a friction producing surface formed or applied to portions thereof. It would also be desirable to provide a plastic hanger which can be constructed at less expense and from lower cost material, in smaller molds and molding machines, and at higher production rates than previous plastic hangers. It would also be desirable to provide a plastic hanger having a friction producing surface applied to portions thereof which can be produced with less waste and at a lower cost than previously devised plastic hangers having such friction producing surfaces.